of course you think that
Carlisle was a ing boss coach that playoffs. Mavs played progressively better in each series as it went on generally due to his awesome adjustments. Like the first few games versus the lakers were close but by the end of series it was some varsity versus JV type . In all the other series they won like the last three games after dropping one or two of the early games iirc
of course you think that
2009 Lakers are underrated.. Might be the 3rd best team of last 10 years behind the 14 spurs and 08 celtics.. Jmho
Wasn't that the run with a historically easy playoff schedule?
West was down that year but Gasol/Kobe were in their primes.. odom/bynum/ariza were contributing. The passing and length of the team was really difficult to deal with imo. Top 5 in offense and defense iirc. They were wire to wire dominant
Probably in all of sports, in the history of humanity.
The 2011 Mavs stomped everyone's asses, and it started with that comeback, I think, against Portland.
Mavs went 14-3 after portland staged the 23 point comebackzz But it did require some heroics snd come from behind wins. There were times where the le appeared in doubt, but Dirk ..![]()
The '13 Heat tired themselves out in the regular season with that streak. They weren't even close to being that dominant in the postseason. The '12 Heat were like the '14 Spurs in that once they flipped the switch (Lebron's game vs the Celtics and the Spurs G7 vs the Mavs)--it was over.
And it was more like Ray Allen over Mike Miller--not James Jones. Allen supplanted Miller as their end of the game sharpshooter when they went to a PGless offense. Birdman was a big upgrade--but that's still just a depth move. Joel Anthony didn't close games in '12. Bosh did at center.
And I don't care at all about Dwyane Wade's offensive numbers at this point tbh. That's just a luxury. He played exceptional D during the '12 run. Defensively he wasn't anything special in '13--and was a s in '14. The Heat lost to the Spurs because of their horrible D, not because of any offensive deficiencies. So I'd much rather have a lockdown defender in '12 Wade and Shane Battier's better D in '12 over the difference between Miller/Allen and Birdman/Anthony. (And i guess Lebron's 3 point shooting)
As for the Mavs, that LA team they beat was a joke. That whole season was filled with
every time they'd up games. They were diverse compe ion in that they had 2 7 footers that could kinda score + Odom--yeah, but let's not act like they were the championship LA team or anything. MVPau was playing like dog that postseason and it wasn't because of Chandler or Dirk. It was hisbreakup with his girlfriend
tbh. He only averaged 13.5 ppg and 6.8 rpg on 41.8% shooting against the Hornets.
As for the Thunder and Heat, I think they're better wins from their name value than from the teams they actually were. What those Mavs did was prove you can't win a ring in this league anymore by playing ty iso-ball/relying on transition baskets in the playoffs. They forced the Heat to go all out in getting 3 point shooters that offseason so they wouldn't run into the same spacing issues again. (and it should go without saying that the 11' Heat and the 12/13/14 Heat aren't even in the same stratosphere in either offensive or defensive systems)
So I don't think they're a bad championship team or anything--but I think the offensive system improvements with the modern Heat/Spurs offenses would be too much for them to handle.
Basic fact imo. Tiago has skull ed Dirk every time they've met. Patty is a better midget chucker than Barea. Actually I don't have time to go through this with all the players--but you get the idea.
Pretty much...if not for VC's utter bull buzzer beater, the Spurs win that series in 5.
I disagree, Mavs competed every single game with us and blew us out in game 2, while I think that was flukey because we were playing bad, they played at a very high level. But they woke us up. They were just as close as we were from possibly taking the series in 5/6. If game 4 goes there way we are either talking about a comeback only 5% of teams have made or we are witnessing a meltdown for the ages on Spurstalk
We'll have to agree to disagree, then.
With the level of play we showed in that series in games 1-6, it was no fluke at all that a game 7 happened is what Im saying. Had we played at game 7 level from the start its a sweep, im not denying that we were clearly better. Im just saying that we could have been up 3-1 just as easily as down 3-1 (especially with game 1 and 4 being so incredibly close). Do you know what I mean?
I think the '11 Spurs team could have beaten the '11 Mavs team but it wouldn't be even close if it was the '14 Spurs team and the '11 Mavs.
Agreed, I remember Lakers and Mavs fans rejoicing when we were eliminated in 11'. Grizzlies were a ing terrible matchup
I don't think they were underrated tbh. Denver looked just as good as the Lakers in the WCF and Rockets just mailed it in. They came out flat in G7. Jazz were a mess and Phx would've played them better.
The league didn't look very promising that season. After the Celtics lost Garnett, people knew the Lakers would ring.
The '11 Spurs were a fools gold team. I have a bunch of those games on my HD and boy were they slow. Duncan looked like a 37 yr old big and TP & Ginobili weren't much better either. & George Hill were playing 30+ mins and we had a terrible bench.
Regardless we were going to get exposed in the playoffs.
That's pretty ridiculous. The 2011 Spurs ran out to a ridiculous record the first 3 months or so of the season (I remember they were ahead of the 96 Bulls pace for a long time early on) and then flamed out in March and April when the games started to matter, like a better version of this year's Pacers.
Like Chicago, the Spurs started off 25-3. However Chicago had an 18 game win streak (41-3) after they lost their 3rd game.
The Bulls were 66-8 after 74 games. It's pretty remarkable that they only ran out of gas after Gm 3 of the finals. They literally went 86-11 till that point.
I agree with almost everything in the OP except the 08 Celtics inclusion, I can't think of a weaker team in the 00's that won it. They needed 7 games to get out of the first two rounds and 6 for the ECF and Finals. Good team but massively underachieved as a superteam. I'd go with the 03 Spurs but would also take the 06 Heat, 04 Pistons, or 09 Lakers over them.
agree on everything, but tony and manu had good seasons, its just that tony didnt show up vs memphis and manu missed the crucial game 1, otherwise they may have made it to the WCF despite all those problems.
We were 3-1 vs the Mavs and we won both on their home floor that year, they were terrified of us, and we had beaten them the year before in the playoffs and would have had homecourt; I disagree that we couldnt have beaten them.
The Mavs clicked in the playoffs. They didn't do particularly well during the regular season trying to figure out the pieces and getting the right minutes for everyone, but once the playoffs started, they got their groove, dirk went video game mode and they were unstoppable.
Regular season records means little, the extra few days of practice allows a team to plan better, weaknesses are exploited, strengths are suppressed, coaching gets magnified. It's just a different game. Spurs fans should know given the failures of the 80s and 90s. Phenomenal regular season teams, easily planned for playoff teams.
BKN swept the heat in the regular season this year but got swept in the playoffs. Ditto for OKC vs the spurs.
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